Is it just your company you think or is it generally true that in commercial less programming is utilized? I understand there's higher degree of imperfect data in the commercial business but there's gotta be some programming work done for actuaries.

I guess in commercial lines work, there is more art than science compared to personal lines work. Also, more expert decision making.

I think it's generally true. Personal line risks are highly homogeneous and you can aggregate them to do a ton of cool analysis. For commercial, each risk is so unique and you just can't do the same level of predictive analytics as personal. With all the hype in data science/Machine learning, I feel like if I don't learn DS/ML stuff today, I will not be competitive in the market place in the near future. And if things get too crazy in the personal line world, I can always go back to commercial (Assuming the employer likes my DS/ML experience in personal insurance).

Thanks ya'll for your responses.
I have a case interview coming up for a commercial pricing (financial lines) position with a hiring manager. With no experience in pricing, any suggestion for how to prepare for this case interview?

I think I know enough about the insurance business in general to do well but if it ends up being very specific to commercial pricing, I'd bomb it.

Generally speaking, personal lines pricing can be fun (for some values of fun) by virtue of having lots of data that you can mine to learn something new, and capitalize upon before your competitors can.

I found "specialty lines" pricing (or commercial lines focusing on various niche products) fascinating because the products can vary significantly by target customer, and the lack of data causes you to have to do more back and forth with the underwriters, and occasionally with producers or insureds, to be better able to interpret the frequently incomplete or inconsistently-formatted data you're trying to make sense from as you form judgment. Having the additional flexibility coming from working in a frequently deregulated or surplus lines basis also gives the actuary a bit more room to play.

Whereas in personal lines I had the opportunity to analyze data to recommend pricing actions, my time in specialty lines pricing could be seen as focusing on validating the expert judgment of the underwriters, balancing against what market intelligence might exist, and bundling all that to help more efficiently identify profitable business and get/keep it on the books.

They both have their pros and cons, and different actuaries will fare differently in either area....and there's nothing wrong with that.

Thanks ya'll for your responses.
I have a case interview coming up for a commercial pricing (financial lines) position with a hiring manager. With no experience in pricing, any suggestion for how to prepare for this case interview?

I think I know enough about the insurance business in general to do well but if it ends up being very specific to commercial pricing, I'd bomb it.

The key thing about case interviews is to ask relevant questions. You probably have enough info from this thread to let you do that. Good luck.

__________________Carol Marler, "Just My Opinion"

Pluto is no longer a planet and I am no longer an actuary. Please take my opinions as non-actuarial.

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